As used herein, the term “terminal” refers to an electronic device that may be used for voice and/or data communication over a wireless communication network. Examples of terminals include cellular phones, personal digital assistants (PDAs), handheld devices, wireless modems, laptop computers, personal computers (PCs), PC cards, etc. A terminal may alternatively be referred to as a mobile station, an access terminal, a mobile terminal, a subscriber station, a remote station, a user terminal, a subscriber unit, user equipment, etc.
A wireless communication network may provide communication for a number of terminals, each of which may be serviced by a base station. A base station may alternatively be referred to as an access point, a Node B, or some other terminology.
A terminal may communicate with one or more base stations via transmissions on the uplink and the downlink. The uplink (or reverse link) refers to the communication link from the terminal to the base station, and the downlink (or forward link) refers to the communication link from the base station to the terminal.
The resources of a wireless communication network (e.g., bandwidth and transmit power) may be shared among multiple mobile devices. A variety of multiple access techniques are known, including code division multiple access (CDMA), time division multiple access (TDMA), frequency division multiple access (FDMA), orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA), single-carrier frequency division multiple access (SC-FDMA), and so forth.
Benefits may be realized by improved methods and apparatus related to the operation of wireless communication networks.